Fostering Global Citizenship in American Consumers: a Case ...
Consumer Logic and Global Citizenship: Case Studies of Internet-Facilitated Tropical Rainforest Activism
Rachel Wilhelm
University of Washington
Political Science Senior Thesis
Along with the social and political changes inherent in globalization has come an increased interest in “global citizenship.” The idea of global citizenship highlights the disruption of the old paradigm of social and political allegiance based on national identity. One source of this disruption is the rise of consumer culture and a new way for the public to construct their identities through their lifestyles. Another source is the challenge to the autonomy of the traditional state government and the growing power of new political players: multinational corporations (MNCs) wielding considerable political, economic, and social influence.
It is in this context that many large-scale problems of global concern are asserting themselves, such as rainforest destruction and global warming, as are new ways of addressing them outside the traditional nation-state boundaries of control. One such way is through Internet-facilitated activist campaigns; as one author puts it, “the Internet has become the substructure for a vibrant international network of citizen activists.” (Deibert) These campaigns provide a forum outside traditional politics for citizens to communicate and act out their concerns, and one way they do this is by tapping into citizens’ lifestyle-based identities so that they are used for political ends.
In this paper I seek to move the concept of global citizenship out of its theoretical space and examine it in the context of such contemporary activist efforts. Specifically, my research is concerned with the relationship between global citizenship and the consumer logic employed by Internet-facilitated activism campaigns addressing rainforest destruction. As rainforest loss has its roots in global systems of consumption and production, it would seem that campaigns addressing this destruction might be well positioned to tackle it in a way that uses consumer logic to emphasize such linkages and encourages visitors to identify socially and politically on a global level. Yet as I demonstrate, although all seven campaigns I analyze employ consumer logic, not all emphasize the linkages between visitors’ individual ecological impacts and large-scale problems or encourage a sense of belonging to, and being obliged to, a global community.
In my research I analyze the nature of seven Internet-facilitated campaigns focused on alleviating rainforest destruction. All seven transcend nation-state machinery and represent a different method of global problem-solving that draws upon visitors’ lifestyles and related senses of identity forged by those lifestyles, otherwise known as “consumer logic.” I identify two campaign models, one that remains “locally-restricted” in its identification of causes and solutions and one that is “globally-integrated” as it focuses on the global connections between the loss of distant rainforests and visitors’ everyday actions. The latter can be conceived as a real-life attempt to foster the sense of global citizenship theorized in academic circles, and I believe can also help flesh out and advance those theoretical definitions.
In conclusion I suggest that the globally-integrated approach to Internet-facilitated activism may serve as a unique tool to help citizens geographically and culturally removed from rainforests link their daily lives to rainforest loss, and offer suggestions for directions further research on this subject might take. Finally, I suggest that the globally-integrated campaigns’ approach has implications for other large-scale global issues which might not so easily employ consumer logic but will nevertheless require a world full of citizens convinced of their own power to help address them.
Thinking About Global Citizenship
Discussion about and theorization of global citizenship is becoming increasingly visible in this age of globalization, but the term is subject to a variety of interpretations. As April Carter asserts, there is a “spectrum of theories” as to what global citizenship entails and the ways in which we should conceive of it. Certainly the notion is not a new one, unique to this postmodern age. April Carter speaks of the current interest in global citizenship as a “revival” of a concept that dates back to ancient Greek and Roman philosophy and that came back into vogue during the Enlightenment and after WWII. The historical roots of the idea of global citizenship are beyond the scope of this paper, however, as I focus on the resurgence in interest in global citizenship as catalyzed by various facets of globalization, namely technological revolution, challenges to nation-state autonomy, and sociological changes in shaping identity. Also beyond the scope of this paper are considerations of the actual potential for global governance that would involve a more formal model of “citizenship” complete with rights, obligations, and a general legal framework, of which some have discerned elements in the formation of the European Union (see Carter). In this paper I will be talking about global citizenship more as a worldview, an approach to global goings-on and their general relevance to and obligations for citizens of all countries. One conceptualization of global citizenship that has been helpful in informing this interpretation is that it is in essence “knowledge and skills for social and environmental justice.” (Andrzejewski) Further on in my analysis I will draw from my research to contribute in my own way to this interpretation using features and tactics of Internet-facilitated campaigns.
In the passages that follow I explain the relevance of technological revolution, sociological changes in shaping identity, and challenges to nation-state autonomy to the idea of global citizenship. I then explain how I will explore the connection between global citizenship to new forms of political engagement.
Changes in Sources of Identity
As opposed to the modern day, in this postmodern context there is no longer a tight correlation between citizenship in one particular country and a clearly delineated, cultured community with a set of prescriptions and expectations. As Beck asserts, “the association of place with community or society is breaking down.” (Beck:74) Why is this? One factor is the shift from identity being derived from local and national sources to being derived from lifestyle and consumption habits. Globalization facilitates this in terms of advances in communication technology that have played major parts in eclipsing space and making global communication relatively fast, convenient, and inexpensive. PCs, the Internet, video streaming, and cell phones have, in Beck’s words, “made possible what has previously been excluded: namely, active, simultaneous and reciprocal contact between individuals across all frontiers constituted by countries, religions, and continents.” (Beck:105)
Indeed, revolutions in communication and technology have, along with changes in employment sectors and enhanced geographic mobility, loosened the traditional bonds of allegiance. As Ong states, “transnational mobility and maneuvers mean that there is a new mode of constructing identity.” (Ong:18) Those traditional sources of identity, the family, the community, the stable job, nation-state citizenship, are breaking down, as Lagos says, “in favor or personal choice and individual responsibility….Life is continually being ‘personalized.’” In the modern era people achieved a sense of personal identity largely through nationality, membership in traditional organizations, long-term employment, and relationships with people in close geographic proximity. In contrast, postmodern society has turned toward new avenues of making meaning in our lives by which we can craft an identity and publicly articulate it. With ease of geographic relocation, new communication technologies, and a media that targets its content to specific demographics through such tools as purchase-based databases, one’s identity becomes a project defined by the “possession of desired goods and the pursuit of artificially framed styles of life.” (Giddens, 1999:198) Thus has emerged the mechanism of personal identity-through-consumption habits: magazines read, web chats visited, television shows watched, and cars driven. (see Turow and Twitchell) A new incarnation of society has emerged where “consumption so clearly defines individual and social identity” (Twitchell:212) and where individuals may “negotiate lifestyle choices among a diversity of options” and adopt the mantle of a chosen lifestyle by following a specific pattern of consumption that is emotional, spiritual, and recreational. (Giddens, 1991:5) In this context individuals perceive relationships to others on not so much a communal or national basis, but on one of “image tribes,” which are “primary media communities made up of people who share the same lifestyles.”(Turow:10)
Challenges to Nation-State Relevance in Citizens’ Lives
Another factor relevant to the idea of global citizenship is a change in the political autonomy of the nation-state. Financial revolutions allowing for immediate online transactions from the office or home, different forms of speculation and investment in corporations, industries, and even nations themselves, and the emergence of multinational corporations (MNCs) that can locate branches of operations all over the globe have paved the way for an intensification of trade between nations that has drawn geographically and culturally distant nations into complex economic and diplomatic relationships with each other. These new relationships have challenged the autonomy of the nation-state by eroding its control over the conditions of trade, the environment, and labor regulations, prompting many question its very effectiveness and legitimacy. Increasing economic integration and the growing political influence of MNCs places demands on the state that interfere with the state’s ability to provide traditional public goods such as a social safety net, health care, education, and environmental regulation. (see Beck, Cerny, Schlesinger, and Giddens, 1999)
At the same time that globalization has “transformed the ways that the basic rules of the game work in politics and international relations” (Cerny:446) we are faced with new global dangers that require concerted action and large-scale cooperation. As Beck asserts these issues are “global and enduring; and it is hardly possible any longer to assign a clear-cut primary responsibility.” (Beck:41) These are the problems Giddens calls “external risks;” they involve not what nature could inflict upon us, but what we have done to nature. On the surface they do not seem to demand immediate action and/or may appear insurmountable, too large-scale to be effectively combated. They are also extremely difficult to tackle on the national level in politicians’ short office terms. Promises about cleaner air or water are not easily fulfilled in a few years and are shied away from- the complexities these problems present for both national and international consensus and action are daunting. Our current international organizations such as the World Bank, IMF, and WTO have been criticized as being ill-equipped to fully address environmental and social issues, manifested vividly in the recent WTO demonstrations in Seattle in 1999, in which environmental groups played a large part.
Thus many individuals do not see such a strong link between the addressing those new needs and our old political machinery and question the relevance of national citizenship in light of issues of global concern. As Frey states, “the concept of citizenship has traditionally been reserved exclusively for the state. But states have proved to be unable to meet the challenges of a globalised world,” rendering this definition too narrow. (Frey:14) One way individuals manifested the inadequacy of traditional ideas of citizenship and political involvement is through a steady decline in voting; as Putnam notes, voting participation has declined by about a quarter over the last thirty-six years. Moreover, 80-85% of those born in first quarter of the twentieth century vote, compared to 45-50% of those born in the 1960s. (Putnam, 32, 254) In answer to Putnam and others who cite declines in voting rates and traditional forms of participation in governmental decision-making as evidence of a concurrent decline in political interest and engagement, scholars note that the context for traditional methods of political participation has changed, and that new forms more appropriate and applicable to the new social, political, and economical landscapes have emerged. (see Norris and Bennett, 1998)
These are the social and political chinks in the armor of national citizenship that are withering traditional ties between the citizen and the state and suggesting that participation in traditional nation-state politics is now of less relevance to citizens’ lived experiences. Clearly this presents a problem to individuals who seek to contribute to alleviating the large-scale problems that may alarm them. How are they to do this when the traditional political machinery of the nation-state has had such difficulty? As I will discuss, one answer to that question involves individual lifestyles and consumer power.
Global Citizenship and Linking Lifestyles to Activism
As one author notes, “political and idealistic engagement have changed ways of expression, and in some cases moved to other arenas” on account of the fact that, as I outlined above, “political and economic decision structures have also changed considerably during the last decades.” (Brundin, 12) One such new arena draws upon individual lifestyles and consumption habits and their connection to global issues. In what follows I explore one manifestation of this connection between lifestyles and “consumer logic” and new solutions to today’s “external risk” problems: Internet-facilitated campaigns. I discuss how these campaigns use consumer logic in addressing large-scale problems related to global processes and how global citizenship might figure in.
Linking lifestyle to activism provides a new way to address global issues outside the traditional boundaries of nation-states and international agreements. One particular way this new angle is manifested is in Internet-facilitated activist campaigns. These campaigns can be thought of in the theoretical framework of “world society;” Beck identifies the postmodern emergence of “a powerful non-state world society different from previously existing forms of political legitimation.” Beck conceives of this world society as made up of transnational players whose activity is often “more inclusive, less exclusive, than that of state players.” (Beck:103) Indeed, these Internet-facilitated activist campaigns draw from a variety of sources to wield influence: local social movements, foundations, the media, businesses, international and domestic advocacy groups and NGOs, churches, trade unions, consumer groups, intergovernmental bodies, executive and parliamentary branches of traditional government, and individual consumers into new relationships that transcend national borders, viewing governments as “only one of a range of influential actors on the political stage.” (Rodgers) Internet-facilitated activist campaigns use the very technology that is helping erode traditional loci of identity and political boundaries to establish new ways of combating problems such that often fall out of the purview of traditional governments. Using the new technological tools facilitating globalization these campaigns may coordinate actions, lobby government officials electronically, solicit electronic donations, generate good or bad press for corporations, link visitors up to other campaigns, and connect members from any geographic area to each other. Indeed, as Beck claims, their realm is that of social relationships which are not strictly “integrated into or determined (or determinable) by nation-state politics.” (Beck, 10) Deibert also notes that these campaigns, “with the Internet as their information infrastructure, (have) carved out an ethereal nonterritorial space, circulating in and around the traditional political spaces inhabited by states.”
The environmental campaigns I analyze in my research move within such an alternate arena in their efforts to effect change. In doing so they make use of the Internet in such a way that they offer visitors a sense of empowerment that jibes with postmodern incarnations of identity. The landscape of the Internet is familiar to many people who use it in other areas of their lives and who know they may use it to suit their own specific preferences and lifestyles. In the context of a campaign, an individual may define the terms of his or her perusal of the site and at the same time discover she or he is not alone in wanting to make some kind of impact on the issue. A visitor may purchase an acre of rainforest land or Amazon-themed T-shirt, thus remaining a consumer and moving within familiar lifestyle grooves while undertaking activism and submitting a “vote” as well: the identities of consumer and activist are not contradictory nor do they threaten each other, but are completely compatible. These sites operate on the idea that, as Beck states, “the act of purchase can always and everywhere be a direct ballot-paper.” (Beck:70) Indeed, they harness consumer logic and help convert the power of the dollar and consumer choice into a version of citizenship action, or what one author has termed “lifestyle politics.” (see Scammell, Bennett, 1998 and 2003)
As Falk puts in, “traditional citizenship is being challenged and remolded” (Falk in Lagos) by the new political activism associated with postmodern social changes. Indeed, this traditional concept of citizenship with its principle in “immutable, monopolistic, and lifelong attachment to one nation” is in many ways a poor fir for the needs of individuals operating within a globalized economy and society. (Frey) Campaigns that operate outside of traditional political machinery and address global issues seem to exemplify this. But what exactly is the nature of the relationship between global citizenship, or as I conceive of it, a general awareness of one’s implication in global processes, and campaigns that use consumer logic in conducting activism on large-scale issues? April Carter speaks of grassroots activism and the sense that its active participants are taking upon themselves the role of global citizens and encouraging others to do so as well. (Carter:96) But what does it look like when these participants give such encouragement? Which campaigns are encouraging the development of global citizens and how do they do it, and what is the role of consumer logic in this encouragement? In other words, are campaigns that conduct activism on large-scale issues, and that use consumer logic to address them, also encouraging global citizenship, and if so, how? Further, how do they help us flesh out the very idea of global citizenship? This is what I explore in my research. In the passage that follows I provide the background of, and impetus for, activist campaigns focused on tropical rainforest loss and explain how studying them facilitates my exploration.
Fostering Global Citizenship Through Consumer Logic? A Case Study of Rainforest Campaigns
First, a word about the nature of tackling rainforest destruction: addressing this issue requires delving into the complexities of global levels of consumption, issues of development, and ecological responsibility. The roots of rainforest destruction are systemic and addressing them plunges one into a confusing tangle of competing claims and interests. To look critically at rainforest loss and analyze different societies’ conceptions of agriculture, of how resources should be used and who should be able to use them, can seem confusing and overwhelming to individual consumers. Indeed, the levels of resource use that are giving urgency to ecological problems such as rainforest destruction are difficult to comprehend: during the 1990s, developed nations composed 20% of the world's population yet used two-thirds of its resources and generated 75% of its pollution and waste. Today the richest 20% of humanity consumes 86% of all goods and services used while the poorest fifth consumes 1.3%. This same small percentage consumes 45% of all meat and fish and uses 58% of all energy produced. (UN FPA)
Speaking specifically about tropical rainforests, their loss is in part a manifestation of these new patterns of production and consumption and the extreme difficulty of addressing large-scale environmental issues today as discussed earlier. The rate at which tropical deforestation is occurring in developing countries exceeds 80-90 acres of rainforest per minute. (Gay) One cause is high-yield, chemical-intensive agriculture as well as slash-and-burn methods of clearing the forest floor. Cattle ranching, dam construction, mining, and oil extraction are also major causes. The loss of rainforests is significant, and has thus attracted activist activity, because they are important components of the world’s ecosystem. They emit oxygen, sink carbon dioxide, prevent erosion, generate precipitation, and are important in combating anthropological global warming, the phenomenon where human activity releases “greenhouse” gases such as carbon dioxide that form a heat-trapping gaseous layer around the earth. Rainforests also provide habitats for at least 50% of all living species (perhaps as much as 90%), are home to 50 of the 250 million indigenous people worldwide, (Novacek:33) and offer many harvestable products such as fibers, spices, and ingredients for cosmetics and pharmaceuticals.
For individuals for whom rainforest destruction is distressing it is not hard to imagine that the origins of such destruction would be difficult to understand and that it might seem impossible to conceive of a way to make a personal dent. What, then, is an individual who is concerned about global warming or rainforest destruction to do? How may she or he conceive of these issues as ones that can be effectively addressed?
One option is to turn to one of the various Internet-facilitated campaigns I spoke of earlier that have sprung up around the issue and that have been successful in “(adapting) to the conditions of communication and mobilization in the new technological paradigm.” (Castells:128) The impetus for my research lies in my supposing that a sense of global citizenship might be the answer to such questions and in my wondering what encouraging global citizenship might look like in the real world and how it would fit in with consumers’ identities. My initial perusal of Internet-facilitated rainforest preservation campaigns suggested that they could present an avenue by which to use the mechanism of identity-through-consumption to encourage global citizenship. I supposed they would thus be connecting citizens to their place in the global system of consumption and production of which rainforest destruction is a byproduct. In other words, I supposed these campaigns would actively try to raise visitors’ everyday mindsets to the global level by appealing to their consumptive identities, and would thus be trying to foster a broad sense of connectedness and obligation extending beyond national borders- in essence, a sense of global citizenship.
Research Intent and Design
To test the validity of this prediction I selected seven Internet-facilitated campaigns focused on rainforest preservation. The seven campaigns I selected emerged as the most prominent campaigns from the web search engines Google, Hotbot, and Yahoo from the input “rainforest destruction,” “rainforest loss,” and “save the rainforest.” I adopted the search engine strategy in mimicry of how another Internet surfer with an interest in rainforest loss would seek out campaigns’ websites. I eliminated from my search those websites with a strictly profit-making approach and those for which rainforests represented a small subsection of their larger efforts, limiting my analysis to NGO or heavily NGO- affiliated campaigns addressing rainforest loss in particular. In limiting my analysis this way I was able to analyze the majority of such campaigns I encountered. In the course of my analysis I noticed recurring differences between the campaigns; although all appealed to citizens’ consumer identities, they differed on whether they linked up rainforest destruction with international industry and/or MNCs, appealed to visitors to change their consumption habits and lifestyle, appealed to youth as well to take political and/or lifestyle action, provided avenues to political information and activism, offered news and information sources, and on whether they featured links to other ecological campaigns. My analysis of these sites suggested two models of campaigns which I have termed “locally-restricted and “globally-integrated.” I have constructed charts for easy comparison of the two models that emerged (see figures 2 and 3). I also provide a separate master list of the campaigns summarizing the basic information on these campaigns (see figure 1). In what follows I explain the two models and explore their differentiating features within the text of my evidence.
Two Models of Campaigns: Locally-Restricted and Globally-Integrated
All seven campaigns make use of postmodern consumer culture and identity-making in that they use consumer logic as a tool to address rainforest loss. They also draw on the familiarity of the Internet to lend the visitor a sense of empowerment and immediacy, the idea that they can “make a difference right now and here, without mediation or delay.” (Castells:133)
These two categories of campaigns, however, empower visitors and manipulate the consumer identity-making mechanism in very different ways. One category, that which I call “locally-restricted,” focuses exclusively on, and directly addresses, the consumer in the immediate. They have a small repertoire of tactics mostly consisting of “shopping to save” and “clicking to save,” actions that can be taken instantaneously. They portray consumption exclusively as a positive force, one that can be immediately harnessed to address rainforest loss. There is little or no mention of the destructive potential of overconsumption, nor is there much attention directed at possible reasons why one should consider amending her or his consumption habits. Campaigns of this model are quite clearly speaking to primary consumers; they address adults with the purchasing authority to build such items as Rainforest Crunch cereal into their budgets. They use the language of consumption, encouraging visitors to purchase rainforest-themed clothing at the “marketplace” and fill a “shopping cart” with “saved” acres.
The other category of campaign dealing with rainforest loss is what I have termed “globally-integrated.” These campaigns also used consumer logic but in a different way; they address “consumer-citizens” and situate visitors in a global context of production and consumption, encouraging the application of an ecological lens to their worldviews. Tactics of such campaigns include prodding visitors to think about conserving resources, such as electricity, and providing ways beyond immediate online transactions to be active in rainforest preservation. They measure success in terms of changes wrought in corporate practices, governmental policies, and individuals’ lifestyles, the permanent removal of danger from rainforest land, and ultimately a remodeling of the nature of production and consumption and even trade and power relations between nations. They seem to take what Castells calls the “ecological approach to life, to the economy, and to the institutions of society” in a way that “emphasizes the holistic character of all forms of matter, and of all information processing.” (Castells:133)
In short, I found, using consumer logic to address a large-scale, consumption-related problem did not necessarily imply encouragement to develop a sense of global citizenship. In what follows I consider each of the seven traits of both models and describe why I classify the campaigns I analyzed as such. The basic framework for the results that follow is an explanation of the criterion followed by specifics for each campaign.
The Locally-Restricted Model: the Rainforest Preservation Foundation, the Rainforest Site, and the AIRR
Appeal to Citizens’ Consumer Identities
Both the locally–restricted and the globally-integrated campaigns link up consumer activity with the rainforest in a way that allows visitors to incorporate concern for the rainforest into their consumption and public identity displays. Such campaigns provide a way for citizens to feel empowered to make a contribution to rainforest preservation and to incorporate “consumer” and “environmental activist” compatibly into their constructed identities.
The locally-restricted campaigns largely do this by offering rainforest-related products and acres to be “saved;” where their purchase is equal to rainforest activism. In extolling the environmental benefits of purchasing such products such as Ben & Jerry’s Rainforest Crunch ice cream, the campaigns piggy-back on familiar items and brands that may already have a place in visitors lifestyles, making them conduits through which people can effect environmental change. This makes rainforest conservation public- visitors not only make a private donation or log onto a conservation website in their homes, but they also make their care for the rainforest a public statement about themselves. They may also purchase a “membership” to the campaign and thus formalize their concern. Other features include offers to email one’s friends the website’s link or to request to receive product and service offers. Thus the campaigns allow visitors to incorporate “steward of the rainforest” into their identities and lifestyles.
Businesses benefit from this relationship as well, as many companies are happy to be associated with good environmental stewardship and have their brands act as shortcuts for ordinary people to be champions of the rainforest. Businesses are also happy to sponsor schemes to “save an acre” by clicking on a button or purchasing from an online store because their participation with the campaign offers one more way to link potential customers to their products. In short, as the Rainforest Site puts it, businesses can “get their name in front of people, to be associated with a good cause, and to generate good will towards their company.”
Consumer logic in the Rainforest Preservation Foundation mostly takes the form of “saving” acres through purchase. The campaign advises visitors that “you can help!” by purchasing tracts of Brazilian rainforest land to be secured from development. Visitors may make monthly commitments, “memorialize” a loved one by purchasing acres in her or his name, or become a corporate or school sponsor of the campaign and earn a place on the site’s links page. Rainforest Preservation Foundation also offers “nature-related art” in the form of rainforest-themed T-shirts as well as products made with components harvested from the Amazon rainforest.
At the Rainforest Site visitors are presented upon entry with the simple order to “save our rainforests: click here.” This link directs the visitor to a colorful screen where the visitor is alerted that she or he has already saved 11.4 square feet by clicking. The remainder of the page is filled with icons from supporting businesses that have paid to be featured on the website. The money earned from advertising revenues is used to preserve chunks of rainforest land, which are monitored by non-profit land trust partners. Visitors are encouraged to follow the businesses’ links (eye-catching icons under the heading “shop and help”) and to purchase rainforest-themed clothing, otherwise known as “gear that gives.” Along the other side runs a list of links which mostly involve shopping and clicking, characterized by the headings, “gift ideas,” “remember to click,” and “merchants who help.” There is also a “Rainforest Rewards” program where visitors who are new to the websites of such companies as Barnes and Noble, L.L. Bean, and various companies selling diet aid products are assured that one or more rainforest trees have been planted in their names. Visitors may also register as members and choose which newsletters and advertisements to receive, thus saving 91 square feet of land. Visitors may also become “friends” of the rainforest by donating certain amounts and assuming a place in the rainforest friend hierarchy in proportion to their donation: Caretaker, Steward, Defender, Trustee, Guardian, and Angel. Benefits include a click reminder service and an individualized account. The contributors’ names are posted in the “meet our friends” section of the campaign.
The Amazon International Rainforest Reserve (AIRR) encourages visitors to “GO SHOPPING!” for items whose proceeds go to “saving the rainforest.” Items for sale include clothing emblazoned with the AIRR logo, products from the Amazon Herb Company made from rainforest-derived ingredients such as “Amazon Warrior” herbal supplements, home furnishings, and garden implements and decorations. Visitors may also donate to the campaign, which will use the funds to purchase more Amazon rainforest land to be kept off-limits to development in preserves. Visitors who contribute are praised with, “thank you friend and hero. You are part of a living legacy.” Members who join as a partner and give $20 per acre can be secure in the knowledge that “with your investment, you are saving our planet and yourself.”
Connection to International Industry and/or MNCs
The first criteria I noticed that distinguished these three campaigns from the other four was that they did not connect rainforest destruction to international industry, MNCs, and worldwide patterns of consumption and production. Addressing the complex roots of rainforest loss requires a look at the new incarnation of agriculture that emerged in the 1970s and 1980s encouraged by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank’s economic restructuring programs, the resultant debt, and a new agriculture that involved high-yield, exportable crops and livestock produced with chemical pesticides and herbicides and logging to make way for plantations, many of them owned by MNCs. Moreover, rainforest loss also has its historical roots in government land ownership policies that swelled the ranks of the poor landless farmers, some of whom slash and burn to clear the forest floor. Roads built to facilitate logging and plantations also contributed and continue to contribute to the problem as they provide easier access those poor rural landless farmers.
The locally-restricted campaigns do not bring up such issues. They generally create a “short causal chain” (Keck & Sikkink:27-8), an easy to follow narrative that assigns causality and remedy in a compact, digestible way. This causality narrative leads back to the consumer who is empowered to affect the health of the rainforests through an immediate online transaction. The narrative remains in the narrow grooves of spatial and temporal locality; the causes are located within the rainforest countries and are occurring in the present, and the remedy is located in the immediate monetary patronage of the website visitors. There is no connection made between global industries and MNCs’ activities and the consumers who support them, nor is there historical contextualization of rainforest loss.
A word should be said at this point about the one industry these sites do reference, the “sustainability” industry. This industry is based on the premise that a profit can be made off rainforests’ bounty while their long-term survival is simultaneously ensured. However, declaring a product “sustainably harvested” does not necessarily guarantee the absence of ecological damage. To be harvested in a “sustainable” manner the resource has to be extracted “without reducing the supply of any given species.” (Novacek:193) Thus the originating plant or animal must produce at least enough of the resource to replenish the extracted amount, in addition to the amount required to ensure its own survival. In removing certain fruits, for example, the necessary seeds for reproduction are also removed and any animal that might rely on it is also affected. In addition, continuously harvesting from the same accessible spots depletes pockets of land and could disrupt delicate balances. Moreover, collecting only the healthiest specimens imposes a system of reverse-natural selection wherein the least fit plants and shrubs continue the line. There is no widely accepted, explicitly defined, or reliably enforced concept of sustainable harvesting, nor do these types of campaigns offer their own. Thus claims that a product has been harvested “sustainably” is something of a shortcut for visitors and, without an explanation of the criteria fulfilled to earn such a label and avenues by which a visitor might ascertain its ecological validity, is not necessarily accurate.
A short causal chain is evident in the way the Rainforest Preservation Foundation conceives of the source of rainforest loss. The campaign maintains the importance of educating Brazilian farmers on alternatives to slashing and burning. Indeed, it locates the cause and the solution not in global patterns of production and consumption or MNCs but in the practices of rainforest-harboring countries’ inhabitants themselves, inferring that the rainforests are being lost due to the indigenous inhabitants who are abusing nature and not according it proper deference. Moreover, the site does not offer any way to evaluate the way the rainforest-originating ingredients in the products it sells have been harvested.
The Rainforest Site makes no mention of international patterns of consumption and production or MNCs when it mentions sources of rainforest destruction. Among the causes it does identify are overhunting and overfishing, population growth, slash and burn agriculture, and illegal trade, all of which fault indigenous people and small-scale activities local to the rainforest itself. The Rainforest Site also offers no way to ascertain that products such as “jungle chocolate” have been produced without inflicting ecological damage.
Likewise, AIRR does not and link up international industry and MNCs to the rainforest destruction. Its website features several articles about rainforest loss that simply refer to “destruction” in a vague and anonymous way. The campaign’s mission statement is: “believing the most feasible solution to this problem is simply purchasing rainforest land and protecting it with forest rangers, we have created AIRR.” The articles often take on an alarmist and simplistic tone, such as this passage which refers to the fires set by subsistence farmers to clear the land:
“If we want to continue to breathe, we need to do something now. Twenty years ago…there were no fires, but now thousands of fires are burning and they are a threat to all of us…. Will science come up with synthetic oxygen?…They are killing hundreds of helpless animals per minute. Stealing you and your babies’ oxygen so you can't breathe. …We are no longer ignorant or helpless in this situation. We can buy the rainforest before it burns protect it with forest rangers and stop this senseless destruction. With 200 trees per acre, only a dime per tree.”
In addition, the site offers no way to check the ecological soundness of the way its products have been harvested.
Appeal to Change Consumption Habits/Lifestyle
Because the locally-restricted campaigns attribute rainforest loss to activities local to the rainforest itself, they do not articulate any actions visitors may take in their daily lives to mitigate this loss; this is the second distinguishing criterion of the locally-restricted campaigns. Thus this model does not encourage the development of a larger worldview in its visitors, does not link them up theoretically or behaviorally to their role not only in rainforest loss, but in other large-scale consumption and production-related environmental issues as well.
The Rainforest Preservation Foundation makes no mention of the usefulness in changing consumption patterns and lifestyle in securing the health of the rainforests. The slogan “reduce, reuse, recycle” appears at the bottom of the introductory page, but no connection is ever made between visitors “reducing” and “recycling” and mitigating the destruction of rainforests directly through patronage of industries or MNCs or indirectly through such consumption-related ecological phenomena as global warming.
The Rainforest Site answers the question, “how can I go beyond my daily click and preserve more rainforest land?” with advice to “become a Friend” (thereby enhancing one’s clicking power, tripling the acreage saved), purchase the site’s merchandise, and tell friends to click. One exception to the general rule that Rainforest Site does not feature any appeals to change one’s consumption habits on account of global resource concern is the “Green Ribbon Pledge” accessed through the site’s “Take Action Center” run jointly with the Ecology Fund and found at the bottom of the introductory page. This pledge, one of many options that otherwise consist of filling in one’s information into an email template, invites visitors to “join the 11,511 people who have taken the pledge to conserve energy.” The invitation goes on to say that there are “hundreds of things you can do every day to reduce energy consumption. And cutting down energy use is the most important thing you can do to secure our future from the negative effects of unreliable, unstable and environmentally damaging energy sources.” Visitors who decide to pledge may click on activities they promise to incorporate into their daily lives such as using a clothesline instead of a dryer. However, the encouragement to make such changes is never connected to rainforest loss or any other specific, recognizable ecological issues.
The AIRR campaign makes no suggestion for visitors to alter their daily consumption habits and lifestyle.
Appeal to Youth for Political and/or Lifestyle Action
Another criteria that distinguishes the two models is a purposeful appeal to youth for political and/or lifestyle action. This becomes a hallmark for globally-integrated campaigns because they recognize what the locally-restricted campaigns do not: that children are not primary consumers nor are they a powerful voting bloc but they may still make meaningful contributions to issues of global concern. The locally-restricted campaigns generally do not offer youth specific appeals to participate beyond games and arts and crafts projects.
The Rainforest Preservation Foundation makes no mention of youth-specific involvement, nor does the Rainforest Site.
The AIRR does offer a “For Kids” section but it features only cartoons, games, and a calendar contest. The site’s “Virtual Community” claims to offer ways to “get involved with other AIRR members.” In practice, however, this forum is not interactive and consists of making submissions for possible publishing on the site. Within the “Community Center” visitors may submit a recipe using rainforest ingredients, view one of three posted pictures of those who contributed a “featured donation,” submit a picture of themselves, browse through frequently asked questions about the flora and fauna of the rainforest, or read one of several visitors’ letters.
Avenues to Political Information and Activism
The provision of avenues to political information and activism is another feature that distinguishes the two models from each other; the locally-restricted campaigns did not offer avenues to political information and activism. Thus visitors leave these campaigns having clicked or shopped unexposed to the political aspects of rainforest loss that implicate not only their own governments and those of rainforest countries but also international bodies and decisions. These sites do not suggest to visitors they get involved in such political processes, thus maintaining the narrative of spatial and temporal locality. To include ways to become politically informed and engaged in the seemingly distant issue of rainforest loss would highlight visitors’ capacity to effect long-distance change as well as their responsibility to do so.
The Rainforest Preservation Foundation does not directly offer political information, nor does it offer encouragement to participate in (or avenues to) political activism. It does link to the “Action Alert” section of a different campaign on saving the Alaskan rainforest, but like this feature offers only sample email text to be cut and pasted into emails.
At the Rainforest Site the “more you can do” link only involves more clicking, shopping, and telling friends to click and shop. If a visitor moves beyond the invitations to click and shop she or he encounters the “Take Action Center” mentioned earlier. This site ultimately involves filling one’s name and address into a form letter to protest certain parties’ practices. One exception is the “clean car pledge and industry challenge” in which visitors may email their lawmakers demanding that Congress encourage the manufacture of cars 50% more fuel efficient than the current standards demand. However, participation is limited to immediate fill-in-the-blank email templates and none of the “alerts” are explained as connected to rainforest loss.
The AIRR does not offer avenues to take political action on rainforest issues. At the bottom of one article about how quickly the rainforests are being razed, clicks on the “I want to help” or “Act Now” links both lead to a cartoon forest where a visitor may choose how many acres to save and add them to a virtual “shopping cart.”
News and Information Sources
This criterion distinguishes the two models in the sense that the locally-restricted campaigns do not offer links to news sources by which visitors might learn about other environmental issues or more about rainforest loss, nor do they offer in-depth opportunities for visitors to learn about rainforest ecology. They generally allow visitors to participate through shopping and donating without encountering references or links that would expand their understanding other environmental issues or of the natural processes of tropical rainforests.
The Rainforest Preservation Foundation offers an “Education” section giving only a few statistics and percentages on the rate of rainforest loss and numbers of rainforest species.
The Rainforest Site features no news sources or detailed information on rainforest ecology, nor does the AIRR apart from a few random samplings of names of rainforest-inhabiting species.
• Links to Other Ecological Campaigns
This criterion is distinguishing in the sense that the locally-restricted campaigns featured only a handful of links to other ecological campaigns, if any. In this way it is related to the previous criterion; not only do locally-restricted campaigns not connect visitors to environmental current events or rainforest ecology, they do not connect them to other areas of the larger ecological movement. To do so would suggest that there are other large-scale environmental concerns beyond the loss of the tropical rainforests for which one may (and perhaps should) become an activist/concerned global citizen as well.
Although the Rainforest Preservation Foundation does feature a handful of links to ecological campaigns they largely fit the locally-restricted model and focus on immediate actions that can save specific tracts of land, such as the Rainforest Conservation Fund and Greenkeepers. Beyond these the Rainforest Preservation Foundation links to an arts and crafts company, a clothing company, a coffee company, and a site for Forth Worth, Texas, its base of operations.
The Rainforest Site is affiliated with similar “shop and click to save” campaigns benefiting breast cancer research and prevention, animal rescue, child health services, and world hunger, all of which operate on the same click and shop principle as the rainforest branch. Should visitors choose to learn more about the acres they saved they encounter several links to affiliates focused on the immediate land preservation effort, such as the Nature Conservancy and the above mentioned Rainforest Conservation Fund.
The AIRR does not link to other ecological campaigns. Its “Links” section features the icons of Permaworld, a commission-based profit sharing business selling “sustainably harvested” rainforest products and financial services, an ecotourist company, Jungle Photos, a site featuring a smattering of pictures of rainforest species, several craft sites, and an irrigation company.
The Globally-Integrated Model: the Rainforest Action Network, the Rainforest Web, Save the Rainforest, and the Rainforest Alliance
Appeal to Citizens’ Consumer Identities
Like the locally-restricted campaigns the globally-integrated campaigns do use the mechanism of identity-through-consumption, the momentum of brands, and the familiarity of the Internet to engage citizens in the issue of rainforest destruction. They offer memberships with conferred privileges and titles, themed products purchased directly or through partnerships with other companies and brands, and other immediate ways to help their efforts over the Internet. However, as I will show, they go beyond this narrow definition of “consumer logic.”
Visitors to the Rainforest Action Network’s (RAN) website are offered a variety of ways to become involved in the campaign’s efforts through their consumer power. One way is to become a member through donating, either once or monthly. Benefits of membership include a personalized "Action Alert" homepage and optional email notifications of alerts. Visitors may also join the “Protect an Acre” program. In addition, the campaign suggests one may name RAN in one’s will, give a gift membership to a friend for a birthday or special occasion, or encourage one’s workplace to make a charitable donation as a business. The site also offers a “Business Friends” section featuring the names of businesses who have given sizable donations. These donations carry monikers based on dollar amounts, ranging from “Brazilian rose-bellied spider” to “sumatra tiger” and “panther” and earn the donating company perks such as being advertised as an environmentally conscious company on the RAN website. Visitors may link directly to the sites of such companies as the Rainforest Café and Happy Planet Juices, knowing that patronage of these businesses is a rainforest-friendly exercise. In addition, the campaign runs battles against two major corporations: Citigroup, a lending institution that bankrolls oil drilling and mining projects in the tropics, and Boise Cascade, a logging company. RAN places a particular emphasis on putting recognizable corporate faces to anonymous rainforest loss. Although there are many other corporations sponsoring such ecologically harmful projects, Citigroup is a high-profile company whose logo and name recognition make good targets for bringing the issue of rainforest preservation into a consumer framework to which citizens can relate. (see Klein for more on logo campaigns)
The Rainforest Web features the categories of “conscious consuming” and “green business.” Through these pages visitors are able to access the websites of companies selling rainforest-themed merchandise and other “earth-friendly” products. The campaign states that “each time you purchase a product, you are endorsing the product and the corporation that produced it—whether you meant to or not. …By voting with our dollars in this way, consumers have the power to change the way corporations do business.”
Save the Rainforest’s main campaign is an effort to preserve a 4,500 hectare tract of land called the Rincon Rainforest. This piece of land is for sale by its 52 owners who are willing to allow the campaign to purchase it, but the campaign is too low on funding to do so outright. The campaign’s site warns the land will be destroyed if not purchased by an ecologically concerned organization and asks visitors, “will you help to save this rainforest forever? You will be buying Existence for it and the 30,000+ species that live in it.” Visitors are provided with an address where they may send contributions. The site also encourages visitors to “help spread the word” about the campaign and suggests visitors install a link to it from their own personal website. Organizations and businesses are also invited to contact the campaign’s managers to become sponsors and be advertised as such.
The Rainforest Alliance offers the opportunity for visitors to “join” the campaign though monetary donations and earn monikers based on how much they give: Member, Friend, Contributor, Supporter, Sustainer, and Canopy Associate. The campaign runs a marketplace offering a variety of goods for purchase such as umbrellas, calendars, prints, and checkbooks bearing the Rainforest Alliance logo. The profits from the sale of such items help fund the campaign’s preservation efforts. Visitors may link to the websites of businesses selling rainforest-themed music, books, videos, and stuffed animals and are assured a portion of these profits will also go toward funding the preservation effort, one component of which is an adopt-an-acre program. The marketplace also offers a variety of “sustainable” products for online purchase that are promised to have been harvested from the rainforest sustainably. The campaign both furnishes an extensive list of companies it has judged “sustainable” and which should be patronized, as well as provides framework for companies to be certified. The distinguishing feature of these “sustainable” claims as opposed to those of the locally-restricted campaigns is that the Rainforest Alliance clearly outlines its standards, demonstrating to visitors the importance of questioning the meaning of the designation “sustainable.” In fact, the campaign itself in 1991 built a coalition of Latin American partners to devise better production methods for tropical crops such as bananas, coffee, cocoa, oranges, and flowers. The result was a handful of certification programs that visitors may research in depth. The main program is the Sustainable Agriculture Network which manages an agricultural certification program assuring that certain brands of orange juice, coffee, and bananas are grown under conditions compatible with the long term health and viability of the rainforests. Visitors may research the specific components of this rating. Another certification scheme, Smartwood, involves forestry and wood products. This program, maintained by regional overseers and in cooperation with local independent organizations, “ensures that timber harvesting is ecologically sound, and socially and economically beneficial to local communities, creates market incentives for producers to responsibly manage forests and harvest timber, and gives consumers the power to positively "vote" for conservation when they buy certified wood products.”
Connection to International Industry and/or MNCs
Campaigns of the globally-integrated model are distinguished by the connections they make from international industries, the activities of MNCs, and the consumers who sustain them to rainforest loss. In essence they ask, “why the destruction of the rainforests? Who is behind it?” They answer the question by looking at rainforest loss in the context of a global system of production and consumption, focusing heavily on the mining, oil, and beef industries.
The RAN website features numerous articles linking rainforest loss and ecological problems in general to globalization and the current incarnation of capitalism. The director of RAN, Randall Hayes, came up with a “500 Year Plan: a systemic approach” to save the rainforests. Components of this plan include promoting “social equity between people and groups,” encouraging “democratic self-governance with accountability: transparency, access to information, and effective public participation in decision making,” and developing “sustainable economic models or systems that incorporate social and ecological costs into the price one pays for goods or services.” In addition, RAN’s “Protect an Acre” program makes connections to larger industrial activity. Beyond offering funding to “traditionally under-funded organizations and communities in rainforest regions,” the program encourages the development of “locally-based alternative economic initiatives, community organization, and resistance to destructive practices such as logging, fossil fuel development, and large-scale infrastructure projects in the rainforests.” This program is an offshoot of the campaign’s primary efforts to end old growth forest logging and oil projects in rainforest areas.
The Rainforest Web’s heading “Rainforest Destruction” leads to an article about how industrial society has historically seen forests as free sources for valuable materials or as dead space interfering with development. The article connects this to specific industries and mentions the role of corporations, stating that “old growth forests are cleared for 'development,' agriculture, cattle grazing, and plantations among other reasons. They are targeted by logging companies for timber and pulp and by oil companies for drilling.” Colonialism and the debt burden receive attention as well, as the roots of rainforest loss are in part attributed to the struggle to “escape the legacy of colonialism” and “pressure from people suffering grinding poverty and desperate for any land not under the control of local elite. This introduction precedes links to campaigns on the immediate factors of rainforest loss such as cattle ranching and mining. There is also encouragement to pay attention to where one’s investment dollars are channeled, as the campaign states that “we have to transform corporate finance into a positive force that invests in sustainable communities and a healthy environment.” Other links include those to sites addressing WTO and World Bank issues.
Save the Rainforest offers a daily environmental question to challenge and improve understanding of the larges-scale processes involved in rainforests loss. On one day, the question addressed the link from rainforest loss to anthropological global warming. There is also an extensive article on the causes of rainforest loss where a distinction is made between “immediate” and “underlying” causes. Immediate causes include logging, cattle ranching, cash crops, shifting agriculture, mining and oil drilling, relocation schemes, and large dams. The main underlying cause of rainforest loss and the general “waste of resources” is the behavior of many industrialized countries. The article also points to the colonial legacy, which “turned previously self-sufficient economies into zones of agriculture export production” and the debt burden shouldered by the former colonies.
The Rainforest Alliance offers a statement by its founder drawing attention to the “untamed beast of inequitable economies leading to deforestation, poverty and corruption” and citing the “desperate need for long-term, practical solutions to these problems.” In the context of explaining to visitors the necessity of participating in the campaign the Rainforest Alliance calls attention to the cattle ranching industry, timber extraction by local and foreign companies, mining, and the building of dams as factors in rainforest loss. The campaign explains that loss is also driven by inequitable land tenure systems and widespread poverty that push many landless people into rainforest areas to survive, stating that “the values and priorities of governments, businesses, and consumers both within and beyond the Neotropics can contribute to deforestation. Trade policies and global markets that undervalue forest products, irresponsible multinational companies that take advantage of cash-strapped governments, and local communities' lack of political power all contribute to the continuing loss of valuable forest.”
Appeal to Change Consumption Habits/Lifestyle
Because globally-integrated campaigns highlight the role of international industries and MNCs and their patrons in rainforest loss they both situate visitors in a global scheme of production and consumption and highlight their responsibility to be critical consumers on account of global considerations. They operate on the principle that although the act of consumption offers recreation and a form of identity, it may be at the expense of the health of ecological systems on the other side of the world. Thus they encourage visitors to think about who develops the products they use and how, manifesting the idea that “through the cumulative observation of dozens of such ordinary life activities, the patterns of ecological and political interconnection begin to emerge.” (Thomashow:136) In contrast to the locally-restricted sites the globally-integrated sites pay attention to visitors’ consumption habits of resources, such as oil, electricity, meat, and aluminum foil that could have been harvested from tropical rainforest areas. These are resources such that increased consumption leads to a higher demand that would likely be filled at least partially by harvesting the rainforests. For example, meat consumption receives a great deal of attention from these campaigns because as an industry it is quite taxing on the soil, uses up a great deal of water, arable land, and edible grain, and produces large quantities of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. The campaigns make the connection from rainforest loss to increases in red meat consumption; the Worldwatch Institute, an environmental think tank in Washington, D.C., reports that world meat production has risen nearly fivefold in the last twenty five years, rising from 44 million to 211 million tons and that per capita meat consumption has doubled in developed countries, even after considering population growth. Thus globally-integrated campaigns call attention to this source of rainforest loss and encourage visitors to monitor and reduce their own meat consumption. Overall, these sites manifest the idea that “widespread changes in lifestyle…will almost certainly be necessary if the ecological risks we now face are to be minimized.” (Giddens, 1991:222)
The RAN website features a “What You Can Do” page that encourages visitors to reduce their wood, paper, oil, and beef consumption and to “hold businesses accountable” for selling ecologically harmful products. RAN encourages visitors to monitor where their investment dollars help fund and suggests they seek out ecologically-minded investment firms. RAN also states in its “fact sheet” area that “although Americans represent only 5% of the world's population, we consume at least 30% of the world's mineral and energy resources….in order to waste less and slow the destruction of the planet, we must change the way we live. We can make changes step by step: become aware of what we are consuming.”
The Rainforest Web offers a section entitled “What You Can Do” that links to websites designed to help visitors eat less meat, conduct business in a more ecologically-friendly way, use alternative transportation, consume less paper, and use alternative energy sources. The site also features articles explaining the importance of making such changes, stating that “citizens in industrialized countries have a unique role to play in saving the world's forests. As the largest consumers of wood and paper on the planet, decisions we make determine…ultimately the fate of the forests. It is important to work at changing both our own personal lives and the larger society. In our own lives we can make a point of learning more about the threats to our planet.” This article also encourages visitors to think of themselves as important components in mitigating rainforest loss: “Neither governments nor corporations take strong environmental stands unless the public demands that they do. It may seem that you are too small to make a difference but nothing could be further from the truth. Joining your voice with others in a concerted public campaign is the most important thing you can do. We can (take) responsibility for our own consumption and (utilize) the economic power of the institutions we are a part of…to change consumption patterns on a larger scale.”
Save the Rainforest features as its first link an extensive listing of lifestyle changes one may make to save the rainforest such as using less hot water and electricity, using less fossil fuels, conserving paper, and eating less red meat. Beyond consumption, the site urges visitors to join conservation organizations, volunteer time and donate money to conservation projects, encourage family members, friends, and neighbors to adopt new consumption habits, learn about local conservation issues, and write to lawmakers. The campaign’s prominent and recurring slogan is: “If you are thinking one year ahead, sow seeds. If you are thinking 10 years ahead, plant a tree. If you are thinking 100 years ahead, educate the people.”
The Rainforest Alliance website mentions in its “What You Can Do” section everyday actions visitors can take to help mitigate rainforest damage, such as recycling, purchasing sparingly packaged and ecologically friendly products, patronizing environmentally responsible companies, conserving energy, and joining a preservation organization. In addition, in promoting its sustainability certification programs and products it suggests to consumers that the uncertified wood and agricultural products they purchase could be contributing to rainforest loss.
Appeal to Youth for Political and/or Lifestyle Action
In contrast to the locally-restricted campaigns, these campaigns acknowledge that young citizens have a part to play in addressing large-scale problems although they wield relatively less purchasing power than adults and are not members of an influential, politically-significant voting bloc. This significantly expands the ranks of potential “rainforest activists” that are limited in the other model to primary household consumers.
The RAN website offers a separate section for students and teachers including facts about the links between rainforest destruction and oil, wood, and beef. It lists seven things kids can to do save the rainforest, including “reduce your oil consumption” and “hold businesses accountable.” It also mentions several national and international rainforest protection organizations with which youth can volunteer or intern and lesson plan ideas and curricula to help teachers integrate rainforest issues into their classes. Another feature of this “Kids’ Corner” is a site with examples of children’s letters to executives of MNCs contributing to rainforest loss. This page links to RAN’s two main efforts, Citigroup and Boise Cascade, and offers a sample letter and address for each. The Kids’ Corner also displays pictures of participating children and notes that if a child has contributed in her or his own way, a picture may be sent in and posted for all to see. One particularly interesting feature of the Kids’ Corner is a prominently displayed picture of a toddler holding a sign proclaiming “extinction is forever,” suggesting both the obligation of every generation to work to ensure healthy natural resources for successive generations and the right of members of those upcoming generations to demand such a commitment. Overall, this section demonstrates confidence that children are as capable of understanding ecological consequences as adults; the information on how to help save the rainforest through everyday actions is identical to that on the main site.
The Rainforest Web offers an entire page devoted to campaigns operating on the local, national, regional, and international levels both directed at and maintained and run by youth, such as the Mother Nature Fan Club. These campaigns are educational, activist, interactive, or a mixture of all three.
Although Save the Rainforest does not offer children any specific content it does encourage visitors to “convert by example... encourage your family, friends, and neighbors to save resources too” and to “teach children to respect nature and the environment. Take them on hikes, or camping. Help them plant a tree or build a birdhouse. Teach them by example.” Thus the Save the Rainforest campaign recognizes that children have a role in mitigating rainforest loss despite their relatively small consumer power.
The Rainforest Alliance offers a section for children and teachers that links to a list of conservation steps they may take similar to those offered by RAN, as well as a wide array of plant and animal fact sheets and links to other conservation organizations.
Avenues to Political Information and Activism
Unlike the locally-restricted campaigns, the globally-integrated campaigns offer visitors avenues into other areas of the larger ecological activist movement. They thus give them encouragement to develop an informed, wide-ranging interest in political events as well as an array of tools by which to become activists based on this interest.
RAN’s “Action Center” alerts visitors to major ecological developments and provides form letters to various political and economic figures, such as President Bush, the CEO of Citigroup, the president of Indonesia, and representatives of the World Bank. Another feature of the campaign is the “Activist Toolbox” containing information on how to start up a new grassroots environmental group, how to give it an “identity,” a “distinct personality…that both the general public and targeted audiences (like the media) will recognize and respond to.” This site also instructs on how to use the media to widely distribute a pro-environment message, tips on how to fundraise, ruminations on nonviolent civil disobedience, and links to other websites with information on starting an effective grassroots campaign. RAN also offers direct ways to aid in its efforts in the form of internship and volunteer opportunities and training sessions run in several regions throughout the country on street theater and literacy on activist legal issues.
The Rainforest Web’s “Action Alerts” in its “Take Action” center offer visitors a wide range of links to other environmentally concerned campaigns suggesting one write letters to governmental figures and CEOs of major corporations. Although the letters themselves are largely pre-fabricated, the linking language and the linked organizations themselves all offer a great deal of information as to the purpose and the urgency of the causes. In general the Rainforest Web’s links allow visitors to access information on a variety of environmental issues and contact information for government officials in nearly 100 countries as well as connect to websites dedicated to helping visitors both engage in and organize civil disobedience such as Protest Net and the Ruckus Society, which “provides training for environmental activists in nonviolent civil disobedience tactics.” The site’s “Government Policy” page begins with the quote, “nothing will change in the Third World if changes do not take place in the industrialized countries” by Jose Lutzenbreger, Brazilian winner of the Alternative Nobel Prize in 1988. This page offer links to such politically active organizations as Congressional Report Cards, Global Forest Policy, and the International Institute for Sustainable Development.
Save the Rainforest encourages visitors to “learn about conservation issues in your community or state... write your legislators and let them know where you stand on the issues.” Its website prominently features two links that connect visitors to political action and activism; the first is to a campaign on saving the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. This campaign lays out the reasons visitors should contact their U.S. senators and representatives and insist that this land remain protected from development. It then links to the government websites of the U.S. Senate and House of Republicans, leaving the text of the letter of protest up to the individual visitor. The second link is to Global Care, introduced on the Save the Rainforest website with, “as stewards of this planet global care believes it is everyone’s responsibility to protect earth for future generations. Help support environmental and wildlife organizations by visiting Global Care.” This campaign features summaries of the Kyoto Protocol and the Clean Air Act and links to full texts on governmental websites. Global Care also links to a variety of lobbying interests and activist organizations for protecting air, land, water, and wildlife.
The Rainforest Alliance runs a program called “Allies in the Rainforest” through which one can find out about and donate to local grassroots conservation groups in El Salvador, Mexico, and Nicaragua who work within communities to curb rainforest loss. This program combines the monetary resources of the western world with the local environmental groups’ accessibility and labor to effect change through local politics. The website offers a way to send a standard or personalized message to the president of the Brazilian environmental agency, automatically copied to other relevant authorities. This website also encourages visitors to participate in its “Neotropics Communcations” program, a media center to coordinate the efforts of environmental organizations in the U.S. and tropical regions. It encourages information exchange to keep the rainforest debate politically alive, especially in countries where rainforest destruction is underway but is often underreported in the media. The program provides “easy-to-access and updated information, important contacts and news about promising initiatives, in both English and Spanish,” in order to whip up demand for effective political solutions.
News and Information Sources
As opposed to the locally-restricted campaigns these globally-integrated campaigns offer news sources and a substantial amount of information on the ecology of the rainforest habitat, thus connecting visitors up to other issues of environmental and sometimes social concern as well as educating them on the natural processes of a foreign landscape.
RAN’s website features a “current news” section with articles and action alerts culled from a variety of sources including papers local to other areas such as the “Idaho Statesman,” university campus papers such as the publication for Middlebury College in Vermont, and major publications such as the New York Times.
The Rainforest Web features a portal with summaries of and links to articles on rainforest issues from various mainstream news sources as well as an encyclopedia detailing plant and animal species found in rainforests. The campaign also features subsections offering information on the flora and fauna of specific rainforest areas accessed by region or by country.
Save the Rainforest does not feature direct links to news sources but does offer a prominent link to Global Care, which does offer access to such sources. Save the Rainforest also offers a great deal of information on the ecology of tropical rainforests; by way of educating on rainforest flora and fauna it offers a “rainforest quiz,” a virtual tour of specific rainforest areas, a “Q and A” section on native animals, and pages devoted to the ecology of the rainforest habitat.
The Rainforest Alliance website provides access to numerous ecologically-themed newsletters. Several of these newsletters, like many of the articles on the site, are offered in both English and Spanish. The site also features links to opportunities for researchers to receive grants, stating that “the Rainforest Alliance seeks to promote and support scientific and social research as well as new methods of tropical conservation. These projects complement our conservation objectives and are accompanied by recommended actions to be undertaken by our organization or other conservation groups.” The Rainforest Alliance also offers an educational resources page featuring profiles on 22 species of plants and animals native to rainforest habitats, suggests a variety of educational books and videos, and other pages explaining the ecological processes of rainforest areas with endnotes disclosing the sources of the facts and figures used.
Links to Other Ecological Campaigns
The globally-integrated campaigns are distinguished from the locally-restricted in this criterion by both the quantity of their links to other ecological campaigns and the content of those linked-to campaigns. By “content” I refer to the extent to which they connect visitors into the larger world of ecological awareness and activism on rainforest or other large-scale environmental issues.
The RAN website offers links to the Rainforest Web, the World Resources Institute, the Worldwatch Institute, and the Gaia Forest Conservation Archives.
The Rainforest Web features hundreds of links to other ecological campaigns on a wide variety of subjects. It also includes a substantial subsection on indigenous people with links to various local, regional, and international organizations working with them and on their behalf in both English and Spanish.
Save the Rainforest links to an organization lobbying to save the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and to Global Care, a clearinghouse offering links to a multitude of ecological campaigns.
The Rainforest Alliance website offers an extensive list of links divided into the topics agriculture, art and media, and education.
To Sum Up: Results
In sum, I found such distinctive differences between the Internet-facilitated rainforest activist campaigns I studied that used consumer logic that I outlined two models of campaigns. One tapped into the identity-through-consumption mechanism in ways that restricted a visitor’s engagement with the campaign ideologically, temporally, and spatially in the reasons they cited for rainforest destruction and the participatory solutions they offered to visitors. This model is in agreement with April Carter’s contention that “buying fair trade coffee or saving with an ethical investment fund need not mean making any differences in one’s lifestyle. It could therefore be seen as a means of pacifying one’s conscience at no cost.” (Carter:95) These sites made no connections to international industries, no suggestion of visitors’ culpability in rainforest loss by virtue of their lifestyles, no appeals to non-primary consumers and non-voters, offered no avenues to or tools for significant political engagement or real world activism, offered no avenues to monitor other international events or learn about foreign ecological processes, and did not introduce visitors to other ecological campaigns. In short, campaigns’ use of consumer logic to address a large-scale consumption-related problem did not imply that they encouraged in visitors a sense of belongingness and obligation on other issues and on the global level, or in other words, that they encouraged a sense of what I imagine as global citizenship. This result can be interpreted as arguing for caution when global citizenship is linked with activist efforts.
The other model, however, expanded the scope of the problem of rainforest loss to speak of a global system of production and consumption in which everyone, especially those in the developed world, is implicated. Campaign of this type tied the pressures contributing to rainforest loss to products and services used around the world and thus offered an important avenue for remediation. Not only did these campaigns use consumer logic to fuse “ecological activist” into visitors’ consumptive identities, they also made connections to international industrial practices, suggested visitors’ culpability in rainforest loss by virtue of their lifestyles and habits, appealed to non-primary consumers and non-voters, offered avenues to and tools for significant political engagement or real world activism on the issue, offered avenues to monitor other international events and learn about foreign ecological processes, and introduced visitors to other ecological campaigns. They sought to infuse a sense of global awareness directly into the visitors’ everyday lives and operated on the principle that as author Meadows puts it, it is a fallacy to suppose that “nations are disconnected from one another, people are disconnected from nature, economic sectors can be developed independently from one another, (and) some parts of a system can thrive while other parts suffer.” (Meadows:5)
These campaigns, I argue, represent a real world instance of encouragement towards global citizenship; they are in essence trying to foster in visitors a broad sense of connectedness and obligation extending beyond national borders. In sum, I agree with April Carter that “groups that campaign for a better environment can be seen as a quintessential expression of global civil society and world citizenship.” (Carter:93) But beyond suggesting the encouragement of a “broad sense of connectedness,” how do these sites help us contribute to the theoretical concept of global citizenship? I mentioned earlier that discussion of global citizenship has generally been couched in discussion of the erosion of traditional national identity ties and of nation-state political legitimacy. It has also been linked to a sense of “awareness” of one’s place in a global matrix of individual action and global consequence. But how can that concept be fleshed out based on how the globally-integrated campaigns engage with visitors?
We can begin by noting that the globally-integrated campaigns in general make no overt mention of the erosion of national allegiances; they do not lay out the theory behind or evidence of the emergence of a sense of global citizenship. They also do not connect visitors up to any real participatory social network, do not suggest that they are entering any type of coherent “global citizenry.” Their articulated mandate to act for visitors comes from one’s daily behaviors, access to resources, and implied responsibility to take what actions they can. These websites suggest to visitors that the essence of their power as global citizens stems from their awareness of their own implication in global processes with ecological implications and from their daily consumption actions; the type of global citizenship I see being developed by these sites bears out Lagos’ claim that “global citizenship may be closer to a ‘consumer’ model than a legal one.” (Lagos) The globally-integrated websites also suggest that global citizenship power stems from visitors’ accessing various avenues of knowledge and influence such as their own and other countries’ traditional political machinery and news sources and environmental and political activism campaigns. Thus the approach and tactics of these campaigns can be seen as suggestive of a type of global citizenship that does not involve the clear awareness of how aspects of globalization have loosened national ties, or a conscious decision to join the “ranks” of others who care about the same issues, but rather an acknowledgement that not only does one have access to power to effect change on those difficult to solve global issues, but one also has the responsibility to make use of that power. Thomashow asserts that “as an ecologically minded citizen, it is my responsibility to interpret the consequences of my actions, to make them coherent, to place them in a broader context, to consider their deeper meaning, and to link them to my espoused values.” (Thomashow:137) Although Thomashow relates this idea of responsibility for the consequences of one’s actions and their links to personal values specifically to ecological awareness, his conception can be extended to a more general awareness, or sense of global citizenship, that I believe campaigns such RAN and Save the Rainforest seek to foster.
Implications for the Future
Research such as mine into the negotiation of global citizenship in real-life situations speaks to the respective roles of different models of campaigns acting outside traditional nation-state machinery that seek to address problems with global roots. Campaigns such as the Rainforest Site encourage visitors to “shop to support” and their “more you can do” links involve clicking more often and telling friends to click as well. The locally-restricted websites, with their use of the familiar and adaptable Internet technology, are indeed lending visitors a sense of empowerment to act on an issue difficult to address through traditional government channels.
This sense of empowerment is quite narrow in scope, however, and could only affect them momentarily in their online, spontaneous purchases. The locally-restricted campaigns, which urge visitors to consume with the promise that a portion of proceeds from the sales will go towards squirreling away chunks of rainforest land, do not build skills to deal with other problems of global concern. One cannot easily “buy to save,” “click to save,” or sport certain brands to address nuclear proliferation or the AIDS epidemic; people cannot consume to overcome them. The issue of rainforest destruction is very much tied up in global patterns of consumption and production; thus encouraging individuals to help alleviate it does configure more of a “consumer model” (Lagos) of global citizenship. But the globally-integrated campaigns that encourage an awareness lasting beyond the immediate encounter, call attention to the worldwide implications of daily actions, and suggest educating oneself and using the resources at one’s disposal can indeed be seen as helping build the skills needed to tackle other non-consumptive issues. Such activism may be able to help facilitate the emergence of what is needed to address the variety of pressing issues of worldwide concern: an informed public with an awareness of the global ramifications of everyone’s actions and lifestyles already introduced to large-scale cooperation.
Suggestions for Further Research- The Visitors and the Campaigns’ Creators
I have explored the link between consumer logic and global citizenship as it operates within Internet-facilitated campaigns acting on a worldwide consumption-related problem, and in doing so have only scratched the surface of the rich fields of Internet activism and global problem-solving. My research has implications for several areas of study; more research could be done on the campaign’s visitors, the campaigns’ creators, and the effects of the campaigns’ efforts. Regarding the visitors, one line of research might examine whether the respective campaign models’ approaches actually result in psychological shifts in visitors’ daily worldviews-that is, would globally-integrated campaigns’ visitors more closely identify with the term “global citizen” after exposure? Further, if such an identity was adopted, would a significant, long-term change in daily behavior result?
In terms of the campaigns themselves, under what conditions do these respective models of campaigns begin? What factors would be involved in a campaign’s shift from one model to the other? Do the activists behind the globally-integrated campaigns identify with the moniker “global citizen,” and would they state that their main goal is to promote its adoption in visitors to the site? If these sites do identify with “global citizen,” do they have a vision of who that typically is, in terms of demographics? Dahlgren states that the small numbers of politically engaged people in cyberspace are “to a degree offset by the sociological profile of the group: affluence and high education are important variables in the shaping of opinion and political climates.” (Dahlgren in Rodgers) Rodgers adds that among Internet-facilitated activism campaigns, rather than aiming to reach as many people as possible, “there is now an assumption that reaching the right people- i.e. those who will respond, protest, campaign- should be the aim of providing information on the Internet.” (Rodgers) In terms of the campaigns I analyzed, further research might explore whether the sites’ creators have a demographic ideal, a class of “right people,” in mind to which they tailor content, and whether this ideal is different for the two different models. I noted that the locally-restricted campaigns addressed the “primary” consumer and that the globally-integrated campaigns allowed for children’s participation as well, but is the sites’ content fueled by expectations on the class, education, race, gender, and political ideology of their visitors?
Effectiveness of Tactics
Another area of research in need of attention is the effectiveness of these campaigns’ methods, addressed both subjectively from within the campaigns themselves and objectively from without. There is a plethora of resources, both in print and online, helping activist organizations navigate and make use of Internet technology. A few of the websites are , which offers “technology assistance for the northwest environmental movement,” and , a national nonprofit organization “dedicated to promoting use of the Internet for effective grassroots citizen action campaigns.” Yet for all the encouragement offered to campaigns to harness the power of the Internet, there is little research available on the effectiveness of various Internet-facilitated tactics. Indeed, as Kutner states, “to date there has not been any systematic research study done on the impact of Internet-based technologies on the information and communication functions of grassroots environmental activist organizations.” While another author argues that “the ‘success’ of the online activities of NGOs and social movements may frequently be unquantifiable,” (Rodgers) clearly some aspects of “success” are easier to quantify than others. Campaigns that mount large-scale efforts against high-profile corporations, notably RAN, may evaluate their effectiveness in terms of responses by their targets. RAN’s website offers a measure of its success in this respect way through its “Victories: the Tide is Turning” page. This page chronologically cites victories such as corporations that, after having been a target of RAN’s activist efforts or observing the effects of such efforts on other corporations, agreed to policy change. One such success is the recent “ceasefire” pleaded by Citigroup, a long-term target of RAN’s boycotts and demonstration efforts. The Rainforest Alliance also notes such victories; one recent development publicized on its website was the campaign’s agreements with the world's two largest coffee trading companies, Neumann Kaffee Gruppe and Volcafe, to “ramp up cooperation on meeting rigorous standards for environmentally and socially sustainable coffee production around the world.”
Campaigns that advertise and sell certified sustainable products online, notably the Rainforest Alliance, may measure their effectiveness through their volume of business and breadth of reach. The Rainforest Alliance states that through its Smartwood program it has certified more than 24 million acres worldwide and more than 800 product companies. The Rainforest Alliance also notes that along with its partners it has certified more than 160,000 acres in the production of bananas, oranges, coffee, cocoa, and sugar cane . Regarding “green consumerism” there is a considerable amount of research suggesting that it is a very popular way for individuals to articulate their environmental concerns. Indeed, as Guber concluded from extensive polling research, “Americans seem more willing to buy green than to vote green.” (Guber:153) Furthermore, he argued, considerably more people attested to performing some individual conservation act than to voting for or contacting members of government with environmental purposes, and such “green” consumer behavior cut across political ideological lines. (Guber:162-8) However, although sites may keep track of the “green sales” facilitated by their own sites, they cannot monitor the long-term behavior changes (or lack thereof) and purchasing patters outside of the Internet of visitors to their sites.
Regarding political activism and effectiveness, campaigns may monitor the actual progress on the political issues they link visitors to as well as draw conclusions from personal interactions with governmental officials. RAN’s “Victories” page draws attention to its fruitful negotiations with government representatives and cites the positive impact of tactics such as demonstrations on negotiations in which it did not directly participate. Although visitors may not have been directly involved in the negotiations, RAN connects its efforts to individuals with the reminder that “action like this needs your support; join RAN now.” Campaigns may also demonstrate success via recognition by outside political bodies; the Rainforest Alliance was recently recognized by the UN Commission on Sustainable Development as conducting activities “directly relevant to the work of the (2002 Sustainable Development) Summit,” citing the campaign’s work in sustainable forestry, agriculture and eco-tourism. However, smaller-scale political efforts in which visitors directly participate, like email form letters and e-petitions such as that of the Rainforest Alliance to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and President Bush urging them to work toward the vision of sustainability articulated at the 2002 summit, are harder to assess. Such efforts are of dubious effectiveness; a recent article on the Digital Freedom Network, an organization “promoting human rights education and activism around the world, primarily through the use of Internet technology,” cited a study by the nonprofit group OMB Watch that found "most Congressional offices give the most weight to personal letters, followed by [in descending order of priority] personal visits, telephone calls, faxes, personal e-mails, paper petitions, form letters, postcards and form email."
Other evaluative data might include how many “members” have joined the campaigns, how many “hits” their websites receive, and how much funding has been received in the form of donations (the Rainforest Alliance has a “Success Stories” page related to fundraising for the purchase and protection of rainforest land complete with dollar amounts and the pictures of donors). Still, despite these measures by which campaigns may monitor their effectiveness, more attention to these issues is needed for, as one author puts it, “questions about the nature of political engagement, the growth of transnational politics and the role of communication technologies in restructuring this landscape are complex, and appropriate methods for researching them are still being determined.” (Rodgers)
Conclusion
Addressing problems of global concern such as massive rainforest loss and oceanic pollution where there exists no clear-cut responsibility, and in a time where nation-state autonomy is being challenged, has proven very difficult. Tackling such issues will require large-scale cooperation. Although many people value collective goods and consider them worth prioritizing, it is not easy to incorporate concern for such goods into one’s sense of identity and consumption actions.
This incorporation is what many Internet-facilitated activism campaigns seek to encourage. The tropical rainforest campaigns I analyzed taped into the culture of consumption and linked it to rainforest preservation. I discovered two ways of doing this, however, one that concentrates on the immediate consumer act and one that suggests a deeper level to consumption itself that has implications on the very viability of our environment and the kind of life we derive from it. It is the latter campaign model that suggests to visitors they inject into their lifestyles a consciousness of the impact of individual consumption on such collective goods as clean air, drinkable water, biodiversity, and viable habitats. They illuminate to visitors not only their immediate consumer power but also the power they wield in their daily lives to either support the roots of rainforest loss or take a personal stand against them. This consciousness, I argue, represents a real life application by activists of the theorized idea of global citizenship.
In sum, campaigns that both employ consumer logic and encourage a sense of global citizenship may help lay the groundwork for tackling other problems of global concern which might not so easily employ consumer logic but will, especially in a time where many are questioning the capability of traditional state governmental machinery to solve issues of global concern, demand a world of citizens who are not overwhelmed by the scope of those issues and convinced of the possibility for action and improvement.
Figure 1: The Campaigns
Rainforest Preservation Foundation ()
The Rainforest Preservation Foundation is an NGO run out of Fort Worth, Texas and has been in operation since 1991. Its main goals are funding and creating new land trusts and encouraging different small-scale farming techniques in rainforest areas through donations and the sale of rainforest-themed products.
The Rainforest Site ()
The Rainforest Site campaign funds and coordinates the work of several NGOs and has been run by former co-owners of the Ecology Fund since 2001. It is not a strict NGO in the sense that it receives royalty payments for allowing businesses to advertise on its website. However, its land preservation effort is conducted strictly through money raised by membership dues, “clicks,” and donations given to the NGOs with which it collaborates: the Nature Conservancy, the Rainforest Conservation Fund, the World Parks Endowment, the Cascades Conservation Partnership, and the Friends of Calakmul. The Rainforest Site conceives of itself as a “dynamic force in the race preserve the earth’s endangered rainforests.” It “focuses the power of the Internet on a specific ecological need- the preservation of the world’s rainforests.” Its main goal is to purchase tracts of rainforest land and preserve them in areas off-limits to industrial and developmental forces.
Amazon International Rainforest Reserve ()
This campaign is an NGO created in 1991 and headquartered in Dallas, Texas with a satellite in Sao Paulo, Brazil. It offers the opportunity to “save” rainforest land by purchasing acres outright or merchandise such as logo products, home and garden decorations and implements, and herbal remedies made with products harvested from the Amazon. After land preservation, the AIRR’s secondary mission is to “foster global awareness of the importance of the rainforest through education and research in an effort to mobilize support for it preservation.” The site affirms that “AIRR can purchase land on your behalf and protect it with forest rangers for a mere twenty dollars per acre. If everyone in America would save just five acres, the entire Amazon would be protected forever and we could all breathe a lot easier.”
Rainforest Action Network ()
The Rainforest Action Network is an NGO founded in 1985 and run largely out of San Francisco. Its goals are long term land protection and indigenous people’s rights. Their main tactics are education, grassroots organization, political and economic activism, and consumer action.
Rainforest Web ()
The Rainforest Web campaign is an NGO created as an offshoot of the Rainforest Action Network (despite this close relationship with the Rainforest Action Network I maintain its fitness to be analyzed separately, as its content is quite distinctive). The Rainforest Web calls itself “your gateway to rainforest information and resources” whether “you” refers to a “lumber company executive or elementary school student.” This site features sources for rainforest ecology and grassroots activism information and lists of daily changes/actions for citizens.
Save the Rainforest ()
The Save the Rainforest website is run by the Guanacaste Dry Forest Conservation Fund which is managed out of Pennsylvania. It is a non-profit charitable organization with no overhead- all donations are used to purchase Rincon rainforest land and all related operation costs are met by foundation grants. Its goals are long-term land preservation of the Rincon rainforest and general consumer education and action to render efforts such as theirs to secure the Rincon less pressing.
Rainforest Alliance (rainforest-)
The Rainforest Alliance is an NGO run mainly out of New York that features 17,000 members and supporters. It was begun in 1987 and now employs 81 workers in various locations in the United States and South America. Its goals are long-term rainforest preservation and general education and its tactics include encouraging better business practices and consumer habits and facilitating north-south communication on issues of sustainable agriculture and business.
Figure 2: Locally-Restricted Approach
|Campaign |Rainforest Preservation |The Rainforest Site |Amazon International Rainforest |
| |Foundation | |Reserve |
|Appeal to citizens’ consumer |Yes |Yes | |
|identities | | | |
| | | |Yes |
|Connection to int’l |No |No | |
|industry/MNCs | | | |
| | | |No |
|Appeal to change consumption |No |No | |
|habits/lifestyle | | | |
| | | |No |
|Appeal to youth for political|No |No | |
|and/or lifestyle action | | | |
| | | |No |
|Avenues to political info, |No |Yes, as fill-in-the-blank email | |
|activism | |templates | |
| | | |No |
|News & info sources |One, an environmental e-zine |None | |
| | | | |
| | | |None |
|Links to other ecological |One |Some | |
|campaigns | | | |
| | | |None |
Note: There are other rainforest campaigns based more heavily on a eco-friendly business model or that did not clearly articulate their format that more or less fit this model, such as One World Projects (), Rainforest Conservation (), and Care2 Save the Rainforest (rainforest.). I did not analyze these campaigns in the interest of focusing on NGO-based campaigns.
Figure 3: Globally-Integrated Approach
|Campaign |Rainforest Action Network |Rainforest Web |Save the Rainforest |Rainforest Alliance |
|Appeal to citizens’ consumer |Yes |Yes |Yes | |
|identities | | | | |
| | | | |Yes |
|Connection to int’l |Yes |Yes |Yes | |
|industries/MNCs | | | | |
| | | | |Yes |
|Appeal to change consumption |Yes |Yes |Yes | |
|habits/lifestyle | | | | |
| | | | |Yes |
|Appeal to youth for political|Yes |Yes |Indirectly | |
|and/or lifestyle action | | | | |
| | | | |Yes |
|Avenues to political info, |Yes |Yes |Yes | |
|activism | | | | |
| | | | |Yes |
|News & info sources |Yes |Yes |Yes | |
| | | | | |
| | | | |Yes |
|Links to similar campaigns |Multiple |Multiple |Multiple | |
| | | | | |
| | | | |Multiple |
Sources
Andrzejewski, Julie and John Allessio (1999) “Education for Global Citizenship and Social Responsibility” Progressive Perspectives University of Vermont, Vol. 1, No.2.
Beck, Ulrich (2000) What is Globalization? Cambridge: Polity Press.
Bennett, W. Lance (1998) “The UnCivic Culture: Communication, Identity, and the Rise of Lifestyle Politics” P.S.: Political Science and Politics Vol 31 December, 41-61.
Bennett, W. Lance (2003) “Branded Political Communication: Lifestyle Politics, Logo Campaigns, and the Rise of Global Citizenship” Center for Communication and Civic Engagement, unpublished working paper, .
Brundin, Pia (2002) “Online Activism: Transnational Social Movements on the Internet” Orebro: Orebro University.
Carter, April (2001) The Political Theory of Global Citizenship London and New York: Routledge.
Castells, Manuel (1998) The Power of Identity Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers.
Cerny, Philip G. (2000) “Globalization and the Changing Logic of Collective Action,” IPE Boston: Bedford/St. Martin.
Dahlgren, Peter (2001) “The Transformation of Democracy?” in Barry Axford & Richard Huggins (Eds), New Media and Politics, London: Sage in Rodgers.
Deibert, Ronald J. (2000) “International Plug ‘N Play? Citizen Activism, the Internet, and Global Policy” International Studies Perspectives Vol 1, 255-272.
Falk, Richard (1994) “The Making of Global Citizenship” in The Condition of Citizenship, ed. Bart van Steenbergen London: Sage Publications.
Frey, Bruno S. (2000) “Citizenship in a Globalized World” in The WTO History Project .
Gay, Kathlyn (2001) Rainforests of the World Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO.
Giddens, Anthony (1991) Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age Cambridge: Polity Press.
Giddens, Anthony (1999) Runaway World New York: Routledge.
Guber, Deborah Lynn. (2003) The Grassroots of a Green Revolution: Polling America on the Environment Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.
Keck, Margaret and Katheryn Sikkink (1998) Activists Beyond Borders New York: Cornell University Press.
Klein, Naomi (1999) No logo New York: Picador.
Kutner, Laurie A. (2000) “Environmental Activism and the Internet” Electronic Green Journal University of Idaho, Issue 12.
Lagos, Taso G. (2003) “Global Citizenship- Towards a Definition,” Center for Communication and Civic Engagement, unpublished working paper, .
Leibowitz, Robert (15 May 2003) “Can Internet Technology Still Revolutionize Activism?” Digital Freedom Network
Norris, Pippa (2002) Democratic Phoenix: Reinventing Political Activism. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Meadows, Donella H. (1991) The Global Citizen Washington, DC: Island Press.
Novacek, Michael J. ed. (2001) The Biodiversity Crisis: Losing What Counts” New York: American Museum of Natural History.
Ong, Aihwa (1999) Flexible Citizenship: the Cultural Logics of Transnationality London: Duke University Press.
Putnam, Robert D. (2000) Bowling Alone New York: Simon & Schuster.
Rodgers, Dr. Jayne (2001) “NGOs and e-Activism: Institutionalizing or Extending the Political Potential of the Internet?” presented at the International Studies Association Convention.
Scammell, Margaret (2003) “Citizen Consumers: towards a new marketing of politics?” London: London School of Economics.
Schlesinger, Arthur M. (1999) “Has Democracy a Future?” Foreign Affairs Sept-Oct v76 n5.
Thomashow, Mitchell. (1996) Ecological Identity Cambridge, Massachussetts: MIT Press.
Turow, Joseph (1997) Breaking Up America Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Twitchell, James B. (1999) Lead us into Temptation New York: Columbia University Press.
UN FPA (1999) “Consumption and Resources” in the Day of 6 Billion Information Kit.
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